Nexus - 0223 - New Times Magazine-pages

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There is a special characteristic of centrifugal force and we must __very gradual curve of the polar aperture, it is impossible to visual- not overlook this important trait. The strength of 'c-force’ ly detect it. This is the same as the fact that we do not ‘see’ that becomes greatly lessened as it approaches right angles to the the Earth itself is round. The curve is much too gradual to direction of spin. A simple day-to-day example of this behaviour observe. Based on the nearly constant merger of warm interior air is water in a basin. If you remove the drain plug and allow the —_ with very cold exterior polar air, the polar openings are almost water to start emptying from the basin, what will you eventually always covered by a thick cloud layer. This explains why, when observe?—a vortex or whirlpool, an empty space surrounded by _ viewed from satellites, the openings look just as they would if rapidly rotating material. there actually were the mythical 'polar ice caps' which government _ Now imagine this same principle in action conceming the con- _ policy claims are at the Earth's extremities. tracting body which was to become our Earth, At right angles to Gardner was led inexorably to his monumental scientific dis- the rotational axis—in other words, the poles—the c-force was covery by the vast quantity of inconsistent information which he considerably weaker than elsewhere, especially the equator; there- continually encountered during his years of study dealing with, fore, although at the Earth's equator the c-force was able to halt especially, high Arctic expeditions. Chief among the numerous « the material's inward progress at about an 8,000-mile diameter, it _ mysteries are: (1) a dramatically improving climate in the very far was considerably less successful in the polar regions, there stop- _ north; (2) the extreme peculiarity of the famous northern lights or ping the contraction aurora borealis; and at about 1,400 miles. (3) the egcentric The inevitable out- behaviour of the come of this natural compass in very high compromise is that latitudes. our planet concluded We shall now pro- its evolution and ceed to hear from solidified as an many witnesses who 8,000-mile hollow forfeited much com- sphere with 1,400- fort, convenience mile-diameter polar and, in several cases, openings. their lives in order Now it is at this that we may fully stage in the logic understand the tue that Gardner greatness of our advances and Reed world, a world vastly falters. Because of more spectacular his study of astro- than officially nomical records and acknowledged. photography as In the preface of specifically relating Three Years of to nebulae and Arctic Service, Lt comets, Gardner Adolphus Greely of became aware of the the US Army whole truth. In the expresses the amaze- precise centre of ment of his Lady © these translucent Franklin Bay expedi- spheres is a propor- tion at the strange tionately small conditions they incandescent ball. experienced in the Between this lumi- far north: “Fearing aan An Applications Technology satellite photo of the Earth taken 22,300 miles above . nous interior orb and Brazil in 1967 (NASA Photo 67-HC-723). exaggeration, I have the shell of the neb- occasionally modi- ula is a large intervening space; said another way, the nebula is fied statements and opinions entered in my original journal, hollow except for the bright sphere at its centre. Why? Well, believing it better to underrate than enlarge the wonders of the where is the one other location at which c-force is quite weak, Arctic regions, which have been too often questioned.” besides at the poles? The answer, of course, is at the precise cen- Before focusing on our own world, let us look briefly at some of tre of rotation, and once again the logic is so straightforward that _ our intcresting neighbours in space. Renowned astronomer we may readily examine a common household example to support _ Percival Lowell comments on page 33 of Mars: "...round what we the argument. What would be the result if you sprinkled a layer of know to be the planet's pole, appeared to be a great white cap... It powder upon the top of a record player and then turned the record proceeded slowly to dwindle in size... AS swmmer comes on, they on high speed? The powder would fly off the record—except for dwindle gradually away, till by early autumn they present but tiny a small portion at the precise centre. patches a few hundred miles across... As it melted, a dark band Based upon his studies of the planetary nebula through observa- appeared, surrounding it on all sides...it was the darkest marking tory photographs, Gardner was able to surmise that the very thick upon the disk, and was of a blue colour." shell of the Earth is approximately 800 miles thick, the polar open- The temptation to think of this blue perimeter as water must be ings 1,400 miles across, and the gravitationally suspended central avoided, because if this were indeed prodigious volumes of water, sun (the incandescent orb locked by gravity in the exact planetary it would frequently be coursing through the many ancient centre) some 600 miles diameter. Because of the enormity and __ riverbeds which criss-cross the dry Martian surface. These 42 ¢ NEXUS DECEMBER 1994 - JANUARY 1995